Earlier this morning my letter to Fenland District Council was mentioned on BBC Radio Cambridgeshire's "The Big Conversation" with Paul Stainton. He also referred to the 1,200 of you who have signed our petition. Unfortunately I was unavailable to appear on the programme today, but Paul spoke with independent Wisbech councillor Ginny Bucknor. Many important points were raised: - The charge could increase fly tipping, especially in areas with poor CCTV coverage. - Candidates standing for election as councillors last year promised not to increase council taxes, but are doing so "through the back door". - The charge really affects the most vulnerable, especially people who cannot take their waste to the dump. - There has - so far - been no impact assessment to establish how the charge will affect vulnerable people. - For many people on low fixed-incomes it is difficult to find an additional £40 per year. - In many areas of Fenland the journey to your nearest recycling centre is very long, along dangerous winding roads. - In other places, such as Norfolk, people already pay for garden waste collections - but their council taxes are lower than ours. - The council's consultation is poorly worded and forces residents to answer in a way which suggests that they support the scheme. The show also heard from various other callers. This included a call from a representative of The Green Party in Peterborough who said that instead of acting as a scheme for the community, charged-for collections become a "private service" and only accessible to those who can afford them. Callers also pointed out that even the most avid composters cannot compost all types of garden waste, with woody products and weeds having to be disposed of by some other means - meaning that even those who choose to opt for a home-composting bin will still need to head to the recycling centre or retain the brown bin for their non-compostable waste. You can listen to Cllr Bucknor's interview on the BBC Radio website. It begins about 39 minutes into Paul's programme here: http://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/p03z9tdc Hopefully I will be speaking on the programme later in the week, ahead of the meeting of Fenland District Council on Thursday afternoon. Please continue to share the petition with your friends so that councillors attending Thursday's meeting do so in the knowledge that many residents are unhappy with the way the council is handling the introduction of charges for garden waste collections. Best wishes, Lawrence